A faraway guest Researchers discover fast interstellar comet
A visit from the depths of space: a third interstellar object may have been spotted in our solar system. The comet is traveling fast - but is probably not a danger.
03.07.2025, 13:43
dpa
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- Researchers from Esa and Nasa have discovered an interstellar comet.
- A11pl3Z alias 3I/Atlas will come within 240 million kilometers of Earth.
- The comet is traveling very fast and will be investigated further.
Astronomers may have discovered an interstellar comet - it would be only the third known guest from the depths of space in our solar system.
The object, initially named A11pl3Z by the European Space Agency (Esa) and 3I/Atlas by the US space agency NASA, is hundreds of millions of kilometers away from us. The object is therefore not a danger to Earth. According to Nasa, it should not come closer than 240 million kilometers from us.
Astronomers still want to find out how big the comet is and what it is made of. What they already know: "This thing is moving pretty fast," Paul Chodas from the Center for Near-Earth Object Studies in California told the New York Times.
Predecessors sighted in 2017 and 2019
The Atlas telescope in Rio Hurtado, Chile, became aware of the possibly well-traveled guest. Since then, other telescopes have also spotted the object coming from the constellation of Sagittarius.
The first visitor from another solar system that was clearly identified as such was found by experts in 2017. 1I/'Oumuamua, a cigar-shaped object about 400 meters long, had flown past the sun at only a quarter of the Earth's distance. In 2019, another guest from afar followed: 2I/Borisov.
